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Dessert

Portugal Cakes

A sweet cake made with butter, powdered sugar, egg yolks, egg whites, currants, and brandy, baked in round tins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Currant and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,057 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Portugal Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Melt the butter until creamy.

  2. Add the powdered sugar and stir lightly with a whisk.

  3. Incorporate the egg yolks two or three at a time.

  4. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form and fold them in immediately.

  5. Add the currants and brandy, mixing well.

Bake

  1. Bake in round tins in a hot oven (400°F / 200°C) with six sheets of paper underneath.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Butter + curranttop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,856 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Provides fat and richness, giving the cakes a tender crumb and flavour.
Egg yolks
Add richness and emulsify the batter, helping it hold together.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air that lightens the cakes as they bake.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and dissolves easily into the butter for a fine texture.
Currants
Add fruit, chewiness and sweetness throughout the cakes.

The step that matters

Fold in the egg whites immediately. Stiff whipped whites are full of trapped air. Folding them in gently and right away keeps that air in the batter, so the cakes rise lightly rather than turning dense.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits about as well
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, brandy. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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